Preliminary steps on a large project to share with my friends...

Friends,

So a short while back I posted a link to craigslist which had a Humongo listed for over five grand. Long story short, no one was interested so I called and made an offer and, a couple headaches and eleven hundred after shipping later, I have a fourth one sitting in the living room.

The other three we have are pristine but this one is not without problems. The first time I ran it, the pressure in the bottle blew the cap off which was a first for me so I am now stuck with an open bottle. There is some chipping in the granite covering and a small dent in the cap but the biggest problem is the dye that has left the wax and stained the liquid. If I backlight it I can see through it but I believe a lava lamp should stand alone so I am not a fan of the backlighting idea as a permanent fix. This sucks though because the thing flows so beautifully! Anyhow, this is the one that is screaming project to me so I am going to kit the new girl.

I know some of you like to use the old wax and liquid. It was black/clear when it began so I am going to have a bunch. If anyone would like some black wax or some black stained liquid, it will be yours for shipping but I will need to know soon if there is interest or I will just chuck it out as I will most likely never use it. That is the first reason I am starting this thread.

The second reason is that I made a discovery of sorts I would like to share. I really want to make a metallic one but there are concerns... First is that I do not want to cut open a thousand sharpies to do the job. To that end, I tried to just get some ink and the company basically told me to eat it. That said, after some research and several hours of diligent phone calling, I was able to find the operations manager of the production line that makes them and I have a small bottle of ink heading my way because we were both in the navy once. That eliminates the lazy concern.

The other concern I have is that I keep reading about how many others have failed because of settling of the ink and other problems that ruin the metallic lamp projects over time. I have done the metallic thing before and had no issues like that, but I also don't want to have to mess with it again other than to look at it appreciatively for a long time to come so I tried some experimenting looking for a different way to make the same effect. At Hobby Lobby I picked up some liquitex ink and put it into a small lamp. I got the impression that it would not mix with water so this is the reason I tried this particular one. The metallic ink was heavy and simply sank in globs as soon as I put it in. No mixing can fix this. The blue ink I also tried mixed with water and made the most amazing and beautiful blue water I have seen yet. A very very small amount is all you need as I overdid it a good bit, but if you are looking to stain your water, you may wish to try this ink. Food coloring seems to fade in short order and nothing else I have ever tried works to stain the water well.

Well, that is why I wrote this today, to share the ink discovery. I know many of us are tinkerers and maybe no one has tried this yet, but first run has a wonderful outcome for me so far and when I kit the small lamp to continue testing before the big girl gets done I will share a few pics to show if it works or not.

Have a most lovely father's day and good, clear flow to everyone,

Jeff

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